PHOENIX — Unless he’s running for re-election, U.S. Sen. John McCain (R., Ariz.) usually doesn’t have much favorable to say about conservatives, but he “crossed the aisle” of partisanship to pay tribute to 35-year-old conservative commentator Ben Domenech as “a very fine man” in October.
It probably helped that Domenech was going to be doing a little aisle time himself the following month when he was to marry McCain’s 33-year-old daughter, Meghan, at the McCain ranch in northern Arizona.
Even if McCain deeply disliked Domenech, whose The Federalist website is heavy on conservative commentary, the senator probably wouldn’t have had much fight in himself to oppose the strong nuptial wishes of his independent-minded offspring.
And was McCain feeling more mellow about life because his aggressive brain cancer was a forceful reminder of everyone’s mortality? In fact, Meghan and Ben became engaged while at Phoenix’s Mayo Clinic Hospital in July after her father’s diagnosis.
“We got engaged because we decided to sort of celebrate life, and celebrate being alive,” she reportedly said on The View television program she co-hosts.
Although the senator probably isn’t about to convert to philosophical conservatism, I feel sympathy for his health condition when I walk out my driveway and see his high-rise condo nearby. I’m on the “wrong side of the tracks” from the multimillionaire politician’s residence, but he’s just a few minutes’ drive away.
Maybe this is sort of a concern for a neighbor, although we’re very different species at various levels.
Could it be possible that McCain might start feeling more mellow about conservative Kelli Ward, too? If so, the day of miracles truly would have arrived.
Ward is the family physician and former Arizona state senator who gave McCain a tough race in the 2016 Arizona Republican primary. In a contest with four GOP candidates on the ballot, the internationally known, long-serving McCain ended up with less than 52 percent of the vote, and Ward got close to 40 percent.
As McCain increasingly aligned himself against Grand Canyon State conservatives, he had some ballot struggles.
Even when he was running for the GOP presidential nomination in 2008, potential home-state pride in having a possible White House occupant failed to burgeon, and McCain didn’t get even 50 percent of the Arizona presidential-primary result, while Mitt Romney pulled in just over one-third of the harvest.
Hardly had Ward conceded defeat after that August 2016 primary race than she turned around and announced her candidacy for the U.S. Senate seat coming before voters in 2018, currently held by Jeff Flake, a junior version of McCain — every bit as much a globalist and establishment fellow as the “maverick.”
Although Arizona’s elite establishment can maneuver well to give itself outsize power over the populace, even it couldn’t strengthen freshman Flake’s prospects enough for a second six-year term in the upper chamber.
Already weak in the polls, Flake announced on October 24 that he wouldn’t run for a second term, exactly a week after former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon and national talk-radio host Laura Ingraham joined Ward for a rally in suburban Scottsdale.
Perhaps Ward’s biggest challenge leading up to the late-August 2018 primary will be the establishment’s determination to have someone more to its liking on the ballot — someone more in the mold of Flake and McCain.
The name of Cong. Martha McSally, of the less-conservative Second Congressional District, in southern Arizona, has been on the establishment’s wish list.
But, CNN said on October 27, “her history of criticizing President Donald Trump made her the target of a show-of-force statement from conservative groups that spend heavily in GOP primaries, including the Club for Growth, the Senate Conservatives Fund, and FreedomWorks,” telling her not to jump in.
CNN quoted “an Arizona Republican operative” as saying:
“The political class is beginning to question whether McSally can beat Ward, especially because it now has become assumed that if McSally gets in, considering she never endorsed the president and has such a low conservative voting record, the president would probably get behind Ward.”

A Bogus Theme

A November 23 report at Breitbart News noted the determination of establishmentarian Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) to stop conservative candidates like Ward.
Indeed, the McConnell-aligned Senate Leadership Fund regurgitated a disproven commercial theme left over from McCain’s campaign against Ward that claimed Ward promoted “chemtrails” conspiracy theories and has “just crazy ideas.” However, even The Washington Post’s fact checker pronounced the “chemtrails” theme bogus.
Conservative Republican political consultant Constantin Querard told The Wanderer in late November, “It seems very likely that before the end of the year Ward will have a primary opponent, but no one knows for sure who that will be. In the meantime, I’m sure she’s working hard, raising money, and building organization.”
There’s never a guarantee that a political candidate will stay the same once elected. Recall how Tea Party favorite Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.) rode into Washington on conservatives’ power, but has yet to fully recover from his self-inflicted wounds over becoming part of the “Gang of Eight’s” immigration “amnesty” team. On the other hand, conservative Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas) seems to have remained faithful to the way he sold himself to voters.
Ward was seen as a capable state senator whose energy continues propelling her through campaign events these days. She resigned from the State Senate in December 2015 to devote herself to the 2016 primary battle against McCain. I’ve seen Ward throw herself into events and take question after question even if only a few dozen people were present.
On the other hand, even back when McCain was healthier and could have built good will by attending Republican gatherings like annual precinct committeemen’s meetings, he often was absent although there may have been more than a thousand people there.
Ward’s campaign website (kelliward.com) lists her stands including border security, tax reform, pro-life, and gun rights.
The site says, “Kelli believes that life begins at conception. She also holds strongly to the view that Planned Parenthood should never receive taxpayer funding.” As for the topic of the Constitution:
“Kelli agrees with the late Justice Scalia’s view that ‘The Constitution is not a living organism. It’s a legal document, and it says what it says and doesn’t say what it doesn’t say’.”
During her three years in the State Senate, it says, “Dr. Ward established a proven track record of passing legislation that supported small businesses, preserved the Second Amendment, decreased the size of government, fought the opioid crisis, protected vulnerable Arizona students, and increased school choice.”
The bottom of the page proclaims, “We’re through with lying, fake ‘conservatives.’ Stand with Kelli Ward.”
Back in early May 2015 when Sen. Rand Paul’s (R., Ky.) views were capturing national interest, Ward had introduced him to an enthusiastic crowd at Arizona State University by saying, “Who is here because they want to fight for freedom?” I spoke briefly with her for the first time after that event.
Almost exactly a year later when I began to introduce myself at another appearance, Ward quickly recalled me at the Paul rally, and that I was with “the Catholic paper.”
There’s the kind of mind that voters might appreciate keeping track of detailed proceedings on Capitol Hill.

Vatican City, Feb 17, 2018 / 05:10 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Saturday the Vatican announced that Pope Francis has reconfirmed Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston as head of the Pontifical Commission for the Protection of Minors, also reconfirming seven members…Continue Reading

WASHINGTON, D.C. – In response to the Trump administration’s 2019 federal budget proposal on Monday, the U.S. Catholic bishops are urging for a budget that shows greater concern for “‘the least of these” and warning that the U.S. “must never seek…Continue Reading

A Connecticut high school student may have to decide whether to remove a Planned Parenthood sticker on her laptop or leave her Catholic school after administrators told her to remove it, her parents said. Sophomore Kate Murray’s parents told the Greenwich Time that…Continue Reading

February 8, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – The Bible’s condemnation of homosexual acts should be taken in “context” with Biblical times, Jesuit Father James Martin toldGeorgetown University students recently. Martin said as well that Catholics who support gay “marriage” should have no problem…Continue Reading

JACKSON, Mississippi, February 2, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – A bill banning abortion on babies more than 15 weeks old passed the Mississippi state House today 79-31. House Bill 1510 would make Mississippi the state with the most pro-life laws if it…Continue Reading

Just three Democrats in the U.S. Senate supported a bill on Monday that would prohibit abortions after 20 weeks when unborn babies are capable of feeling pain. The Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, which has strong public support from Republicans…Continue Reading

ROME, January 30, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – In an exclusive interview two weeks after issuing a profession of immutable truths about sacramental marriage, Bishop Athanasius Schneider is inviting his brother bishops around the world to join in raising a common voice…Continue Reading

As Katholisch.de, the official website of the German bishops, reports today, Cardinal Willem Eijk, the Dutch cardinal and Metropolitan Archbishop of Utrecht, requested that Pope Francis bring light into the confusion concerning the question as to how to deal with…Continue Reading

When Selena Miller, a practicing Catholic, applied to DePaul, she had no idea it was a Catholic university. Damita Meneves, another practicing Catholic, said she has met only one other Catholic student in her first year at DePaul. DePaul is…Continue Reading

His Eminence, Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke, spoke recently with Thinking with the Church, hosted by Chris Altieri, who is also a regular contributor to Catholic World Report. Cardinal Burke responds to questions regarding the interpretation and reception of the post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation, Amoris…Continue Reading

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By DON FIER (Editor’s Note: His Eminence Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke, Patron of the Sovereign Military Order of Malta and Founder of the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in La Crosse, Wis., graciously took time out of his busy schedule to grant The Wanderer a wide-ranging interview during a recent visit to the Shrine. Included among the topics…Continue Reading

By RAYMOND LEO CARDINAL BURKE (Editor’s Note: His Eminence Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke delivered the address below at the 32nd Annual Church Teaches Forum, “The Message of Fatima: Peace for the World,” Galt House, Louisville, Ky., July 22, 2017. The address is reprinted here with the kind permission of Cardinal Burke. All rights reserved. This is part one of the…Continue Reading

Catechism

Today . . .

There’s nothing, it seems, that the abortion chain Planned Parenthood won’t sue over. On Thursday, affiliates of the abortion chain in seven states sued the Trump administration for cutting funding for their questionable teen pregnancy prevention programs. The Daily Nonpareil reports the lawsuits argue that the Trump administration wrongly cut their funding prematurely and without cause. Nine groups, including Planned Parenthood affiliates in Washington, Iowa, North Carolina, South C

CAMBRIDGE, England, February 15, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – A respected Catholic historian and philosopher challenged Cardinal Blase Cupich during a lecture last week about Pope’ Francis so-called “revolution of mercy” that has caused what many are defending as a “paradigm shift” in Catholic practice. Professor John Rist, after listening to a February 9 lecture at Cambridge Universityin which Cardinal Cupich praised Pope Francis’ “paradigm shift” in Catholic practice, asked the Cardinal at the end of the lect

VIENNA, Austria, February 14, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – Austria’s bishops, led by Vienna’s Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, are indignant over a retired bishop’s passionate defense of Catholic teaching in opposing Church “blessings” for homosexual unions. After Bishop Andreas Laun, the retired Auxiliary Bishop of Salzburg, Austria, published Monday his strong rebuke of the German bishops for proposing to bless homosexual couples, there has been an inten

Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago is all for clarity. It has been a consistent theme, as when in September of 2017 he issued a decree banning guns in all parishes, schools and other facilities across the archdiocese “so there would be absolute clarity on our position.” His official statement put “clarity” in italics. When he was bishop of Rapid City, he called for “civility and clarity” in discussing legislation that would limit abortion, but he…Continue Reading

BEIJING — A group of influential Catholics published an open letter Monday express their shock and disappointment at report that the Vatican could soon reach a deal with the Chinese government, warning that it could create a schism in the church in China. The Holy See has been in negotiations for several years with the Chinese Communist Party and is now belie

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WASHINGTON, D.C. — Within a week of taking office on January 23, 2017, President Trump reinstated and expanded the Mexico City Policy, now called the Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance, which bans U.S. funding for abortions overseas. The expanded policy prohibits $9 billion in U.S. taxpayer money from funding foreign organizations that perform or…Continue Reading

By HANNAH BROCKHAUS VATICAN CITY (CNA/EWTN News) — The Congregation for the Causes of Saints has approved the second miracle needed for the canonization of Blessed Pope Paul VI, allowing his canonization to take place, possibly later this year. According to Vatican Insider, the Congregation for the Causes of Saints approved the miracle by a…Continue Reading

By STEPHEN M. KRASON (Editor’s Note: Stephen M. Krason’s Neither Left nor Right, but Catholic column appears monthly [sometimes bimonthly] in Crisis. He is professor of political science and legal studies and associate director of the Veritas Center for Ethics in Public Life at Franciscan University of Steubenville. He is also cofounder and president of…Continue Reading

By LISA BOURNE (Editor’s Note: LifeSiteNews ran this story on February 5.) + + + A Catholic priest is calling on bishops to excommunicate the 14 Catholic-identifying U.S. senators who voted two weeks ago against banning late-term abortions. He is also calling on priests to deny the Catholic pro-abortion senators Holy Communion. “Today is the…Continue Reading

By JAMES LIKOUDIS The centuries-old theological debate concerning the existence of Limbo for unbaptized babies (the limbo puerorum as a state of natural happiness) led to the 2007 publication of the document The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die Without Being Baptized by the International Theological Commission (ITC). The commission concluded there are “serious…Continue Reading

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Our Catholic Faith (Section B of print edition)

By DON FIER For a variety of reasons (a defect of consent, a diriment impediment, or a defect of the required form), many supposed modern-day marriages entered into by Catholic persons are invalid from their origin in the eyes of God and the Church. However, as we saw last week, depending on the circumstances, the Church has procedures by which…Continue Reading

Q. Concerning what our Blessed Mother said in Fatima about the rosary, I am confused as to whether or not she meant us to meditate on the mysteries while we are praying the Hail Marys or whether she meant us to meditate on the mysteries right before we say the Hail Marys. The consensus seems to be that we are…Continue Reading

By FR. ROBERT ALTIER Second Sunday Of Lent Readings: Gen. 22:1-2, 9a, 10-13, 15-18 Romans 8:31b-34 Mark 9:2-10 In the first reading today we hear about Abraham’s nearly incomprehensible act of faith and love for God shown in his willingness to sacrifice his own son. We have to be careful not to read this in a vacuum. This test, which…Continue Reading

By ANDREA GAGLIARDUCCI (Wanderer Editor’s Note: Catholic News Agency on February 3 published a commentary concerning a 1989 Vatican response to dissent against Humanae Vitae. Below is an excerpted version of that commentary. Following that, we reprint the full text of the 1989 Vatican response, which, as the CNA commentary explains, is now available on the Vatican’s website. Please also…Continue Reading

By FR. KEVIN M. CUSICK A joke sometimes recounted among clergy goes along these lines: Someone greets a wise old priest by asking, “What’s new?”, and he responds, sagely, “Christ is risen!” The humor here is less about what’s new than about the fact that everything, other than the only true revolution of Christ’s Incarnation and triumph over death, is…Continue Reading

By CAROLE BRESLIN Great sinners make great saints. It takes a strong-willed child to become a saint. These are statements which would easily fit saints such as Mary Magdalene and St. Augustine. In the thirteenth century, a young lady free in spirit and strong in will led such a life that she was essentially driven from her home village, but…Continue Reading

By CAROLE BRESLIN In the lives of the saints one thing is very common: They have such a strong desire to do God’s will that nothing will hinder their work. Many saints, despite illness, weak health, or many other obstacles achieved their goals. Frequently the amount of work accomplished by such individuals seems humanly impossible — and, of course, it…Continue Reading